Stub Mandrel

Should I fit these with the round or flat side to the frets? 😜

Good point; I suspect that this happens when people decouple the switched -ve supply but don't decouple the +ve supply. This is what the datasheet shows, trying to minimise component count, but if the pump is at the end of a daisy chain some decoupling at the converter is going to be needed.

I've been looking into high pass filter design. I'm looking at a basic Sallen & Key format with two two-pole stages switchable for 12dB an 24dB per octave. The advantage of this is simplicity in design and also it's easy to make one stage variable frequency to tune the response (e.g. set one stage to ~30Hz and the other variable, say 20-50Hz). A two-stage butterworth or chebyshev filter would give a sharper 'knee'. This does mean looking at gain greater than 1. My thought is that the 'cost' of going to chebyshev is even higher gain and a less flat curve for the pass band. While 'gain is good', ideally a filter like this should have gain close to 1 for the pass band so what comes out is essentially what goes in. Too high a gain means it could run out of headroom on transients, which defeats the object of the exercise. I plan to use a charge pump to get +/- 9V to get plenty of headroom. My thought is the butterworth arrangement (very flat passband, relatively sharp knee) is ideal, and tune it to have knee at about 30Hz by tuning for -3dB in the mid-low twenties.

A few people mentioned cleaning off a sticky coating with isopropanol. I've had a few things with a 'soft touch coating' (e.g. a gps and a mini-speaker, amongst other things) that went the same way with age, so I assumed this was what they meant. http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php/Soft_Touch_Removal

The one I bought looks the same, but has hard plastic without a soft-touch coating.

I'm more worried about guitarist's nipple... may have to get a pair of pasties!

Can you see the bottom row when you are playing it?

Extreme relicking... Perhaps not fair to use a guitar with a tremelo? Surley the absence of frets has a huge effect on tone 🤣

I'm surprised; all of the acoustic guitars/basses with a fitted preamp I have tried have similar output to a normal active bass, let alone a passive one. Was it just a lack of volume or a lack of 'presence'?

I wish I hadn't googled that.

I'm assuming they reduce the handling noise on an acoustic...?

Probably because most are marketed to beginners who assume fret lines will make playing easier. In reality, they are hard to see when standing, and once you get some practice you discover your fingers pretty much know where to go anyway.

In my view the construction of the bass has more impact on the sound. A through-neck headless lightweight with a vestigial body will have more sustain than many heavyweights with bolt on necks.

I find that if you get a selection of 2.5kg and 5kg barbell weights and wrap them in gaffa tape (to prevent scratching) you can add variable amounts of extra mass to you bass. With the help of an assistant it's even possible to add or remove extra sustain, bottom end and presence just by varying the mass as you play.

Three colour tobacco sunburst, transparent blue burst, candy apple red. But in all honesty, I like some variety. Six string wise, my satin finished natural Ibanez is very lovely too, as is a white Tokai SG not sure it would count as 'olympic'.

Well, I got this: Minor scuffing, but essentially a £400-£500 bass of £70 🙂 I like the sound and feel of Tanglewoods, but it might need a bit of a setup, if it hasn't been done already. MIght put black tapewounds on it.

We have a progster in our midst!

Approved, by the Campaign for Realistic Avatars. 🙂

Don't... anyway only a fool would call that 'low end' whatever teh price tag 🙂

Blocked video 😞 But yes I have heard her playing before. 🙂

That's how the headstock got broken off - disembowelling a unicorn.

I have an upright, straight strung, piano in fully working condition, pre-1950s, a tad scruffy, previously belonged to a colleague whose mum was a piano teacher. One string has a slight buzz when you release it or nearby keys, it's probably the E below middle C. The tuner tweaked it to get rid of this, but it came back, I think it's a dodgy damper but it should be curable. Free to anyone able to arrange transport from Burton-upon-Trent area. Movable by two strong and willing folks, three to lift up into a van. I'm willing to assist.